Ukrainian PG on Burisma: “No Politicians Tried to Influence My Decisions"

The new Prosecutor General of Ukraine Rouslan Riaboshapka held the first press conference on October 4. At the briefing, Riaboshapka announced impending reforms in the Prosecutor General’s Office that will take up to two years to implement. Among other things, the Prosecutor General commented on the situation around Burisma.

According to Riaboshapka, the Prosecutor General's Office is currently auditing old proceedings, including the Burisma Company, which had the son of the former U.S. vice president and Donald Trump’s opponent in the 2020 election Joe Biden, Hunter Biden on its board of directors.

“Regarding the sphere where [ex-ecology minister Mykola] Zlochevsky and [businessman Serhiy] Kurchenko may be involved : there are over a dozen such proceedings. But we are now reviewing all the proceedings that were closed or broken up, or were investigated earlier, with a view to deciding where unlawful procedural decisions had been taken so that  we can review them,” Prosecutor General stated.

READ MORE: Biden, Shokin, and Zlochevsky: How the Burisma Case Unfolded

In response to the question of whether anyone had approached him about the proceedings against Biden, Riaboshapka said: “No foreign or domestic politicians ... called me or tried to influence my decisions on specific criminal proceedings.”

READ MORE: Oliver Bullough Talks Giuliani, Biden, and Burisma

Riaboshapka also asserted that the PGO is independent of the Presidential Office and free from political influence of Volodymyr Zelenskyy.

Some of the other loud cases the PGO plans to focus on are the cases of the murdered civic activist Kateryna Handziuk, ousted former president Viktor Yanukovych and the events of the EuroMaidan, as well as the "diamond prosecutors" case.